Lucy Vickery

Spectator competition winners: William McGonagall on Magaluf

Your latest challenge was to imagine William Topaz McGonagall’s poetic response to Magaluf. McGonagall was much taken with the town of Torquay, and wrote a poem singing its praises. But what would the Tayside Tragedian have made of Shagaluf? He took a dim view of alcohol, if these lines are anything to go by:

Oh, thou demon Drink, thou fell destroyer; Thou curse of society, and its greatest annoyer. What hast thou done to society, let me think? I answer thou hast caused the most of ills, thou       demon Drink.

Some of you clearly reckon, though, that beneath the teetotal, god-fearing façade lurked something altogether wilder. Commendations go to Nicholas Hodgson, David Shields and Adrian Fry. The winners, below, pocket £35 each.

Basil Ransome-Davies Let me invoke my muse to describe and explain What a wonderful town there exists on an island       of Spain, Where in general the natives speak Spanish And visitors can make their troubles vanish, Thanks to the magnificent Spanish sense of       hospitality And famous, hot-blooded Latin vitality.

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